Magic Life And Essence
'Magic, is Life ' here are some terms you will need to become familiar with, 'Magic rating: ' a measure of how alive how full of essence or how much effort was put into a spell or magical effect , it is a 2 digit number from 02 to 99, (under exceptional circumstances a magic rating can be higher than 99) Magic Rating is used for a number of reasons, to determine the length of a spells duration, for dispelling, parrying, ect. whenever you cast a spell you should Note down the Magic rating, some magical beings have a magic rating, 'Essence: ' essence is the raw magical energy. it has many names, the life force, The essence. Mojo the primal, the enlightenment, the juice, the power, the paradox the chaos the energy the hoodoo the juju the things you aint even tried, or in the case of necromancy your friends on the other side. essence is sometimes referred to by wizards as a "charge" or by warlocks as "favour" it has a numerical value, and can be divided into two main types, "minor essence" is the most common form of essence, most classes start with D10+X minor essence, the Magic ratings of minor essence effects are usually calculated by adding the dice together, the other kind of essence is significant essence, significant essence gives more bang for your buck, and generally gives you a better magic rating, (just read the dice as is) most classes start with D5+X significant essence, it is important to note, that significant essence can do the work of up to 10 minor essence, but it's a one way street, more is always less, you can't take 10 or 20 or 100 charges of minor essence and ever get anywhere near a single charge of significant essence, finally the mythical might not exist holy grail of magic, the major essence , major essence has been rumoured to exist, if it did, it would be 100 times as potent as any mortal magic, only gods will be wielding it, or , maybe godlike beings, a single juju of Major Essence might give a warlock the juice he needs to level parts of London single handedly, if a major essence did exist, it could do the work of 10 hoodoo's of significant essence or 100 primal of minor essence. Effort (magical) in effect the difference between effort and essence, is one of action, essence is a pool of life force , effort is an act of will. you can perform minor efforts and draw on your minor essence, or significant effort to draw on your significant essence, effort is measured on a scale of 1-10, 1 being a weak magical effect, easy to perform, 10 being a strain on yourself some people talk about effort in terms of little tasks you must do to cast a spell, you will often hear "i had to put in 6 minor efforts to block that spell!" the wizard in question is describing their hand motions and words and force of will, as 6 separate things , when really he made a single minor effort , that was strenuous enough to use up 6 of his precious essence, this is a fine way to talk about it in game, and makes no difference mechanically, as usual, a minor effort can be performed with significant essence, but a significant effort is in another league, and cannot be performed with any number of minor essence, magic is unfair like that. DAM-x short for damage type, often magic is weird and wonderful, and will have a damage type, those are discussed in another section, but you should familiarise yourself with ones common to your chosen elements, PEN magic can often penetrate mundane defences (often, not always) some spells have a pen rating, they come in 3 flavours Pen A ignores only armour Pen T ignores only toughness pen E ignores all that sizzle, example: solyells "electric boogaloo shotgun" is a Magick blast with Pen T6 it ignores up to 6 of your damage reduction gained from the physicality stat, or the tough skill solyells "dragon fang spear" is a warlock blast with Pen E d10+1, it can potentially ignore up to 11 of armour, toughness, magical spells, thick walls, hester's "ephemeral slash" is a magicians magical blast contained in a sword cane, with PEN A4 it ignores up to 4 worn armour, or physical armour that has been created with an evocation (like ice) Failure: results in the spell not working, wizard casting style and controlled casting style users do not expend their effort if they fail. unless the triple bollocks of fail is rolled only people that use the power casting style or the much forbidden non existent blood magic style have something to loose from a failled roll. power casters loose half the essence it should have cost as their style necessitates them putting a lot of effort into casting. Casting time: Primary casting time: spells have primary casting times, if you arent sure what your spells primary casting time is, ask the almighty BM, the available times are free quick minor/half significant/standard Full extended / full X